The S&P 500 Index has officially gained each of the first four months of the year for the first time since 2013. This comes on the heels of the best first quarter since 1998. Six straight months in green has been the best monthly win streak to start a year, and that last happened in 1996.
Starting a year with strength like this historically has been a good sign, even though stocks in May saw a nearly 5% correction.
“Although we wouldn’t be surprised to see continued volatility over the coming months, the good news is a great start to a year has had a funny way of eventually resolving higher,” explained LPL Senior Market Strategist Ryan Detrick. “In fact, the rest of the year has been higher an incredible 14 out of 15 times after the first four months were in the green!”
As our LPL Chart of the Day shows, the S&P 500 returns the rest of the year (final 8 months) have been more than twice as strong as the average year returns—10% versus 4.7%—following four straight monthly gains to kick off a new year. There’s always a catch though, and in this case we’ve seen an average pullback of more than 8% the rest of the year.
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